Bradford Bulls maintained their outside chances of salvaging a play-off place from a mostly miserable season with a thumping 42-18 win against the Catalans Dragons at Odsal yesterday.

Bradford had lost nine of their previous 11 home matches and were trailing 6-0 after 18 minutes before the introduction of Sam Burgess, the England forward who is the subject of a bidding war between several leading Australian clubs which recently led to an unlikely evening with the South Sydney owner Russell Crowe near the set of the new version of Robin Hood he is filming in Derbyshire.

Burgess created and scored a try with his first and second touches, then laid on another for Rikki Sheriffe with a powerful break, and although he later had to be helped off with a sternum injury, by then the game was won. "Sam punched a few holes in them and we played off the back of that," said the Bulls coach Steve McNamara, who would not be drawn on displacing the faltering Catalans from the top eight.

"It's out of our hands completely, but the players have made a commitment to end the season as the form team in the competition," said Bradford's coach Steve McNamara. "I think we're going some way towards that."

This was their third consecutive win, their best run of form all year, and with remaining games against Salford and Hull - two of the three teams below them in the table - they look a good bet to end with five from five.

In contrast the Catalans were awful, their halfhearted performance all the more disappointing as they could have knocked Bradford out of play-off contention, and virtually secured their own place. "We had a total lack of discipline, which is very disappointing at this time of year," said their coach Kevin Walters.

However he hopes to have Clint Greenshields, Thomas Bosc and possibly Jean-Philippe Baile back for their next game at home to Wakefield in a fortnight, which will now be a must-win fixture for the Dragons as they end with a trip to St Helens.

Sebastien Raguin had put them ahead in the 11th minute but those tries from Burgess and Sheriffe, followed by further scores from Chris Nero and Steve Menzies' 13th try of the season, had the game won by half-time. Wayne Godwin, Paul Sykes, Glenn Morrison and Paul Deacon helped themselves against some shocking Catalans tackling in the second half, with Deacon adding five goals for a personal haul of 14 points.